Columbus partner Mike Asensio was quoted in the November 16, 2009, Modern Healthcare article, "Laboring to Unite."
According to the article, after years of feuding and raiding each other's ranks, more healthcare unions are joining hands so they can work together on a common pro-labor agenda. No other healthcare union collaboration sparked more discussion or scrutiny than when the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, or CNA/NNOC, made the surprise announcement in March 2009 that they had signed a formal truce.
The unions' feud was so intense that just one year earlier, the CNA/NNOC effectively squashed the unionization drive that was in progress at nine Ohio hospitals owned by Catholic Healthcare Partners after the Cincinnati-based system struck a labor-neutrality agreement with the SEIU. The CNA/NNOC blanketed the 8,100 employees who were set to vote with negative information about what it called a "backroom deal" between its rival labor union and the health system, causing the two sides to call off the elections before all the votes could be cast, according to the article.
"No question that benefited the employer there," said Asensio. Although the truce between the SEIU and the CNA/NNOC has not yet led to any joint-organizing drives that have resulted in new bargaining units, Asensio said the new cooperation is already evident in the lack of negative campaigning between the two groups.